In the summer of 2022, a young woman named Ashley Dale was killed in her Liverpool home — not for anything she had done, but because of a feud she had inherited through love. A jury has now found four men guilty of her murder, a verdict that closes one chapter in a story about how organised crime's gravitational pull can draw in the entirely innocent. Dale, 28, was an environmental health officer who spent her final evening watching television with her dog; the men convicted of ending her life were bound together by a dispute over stolen drugs that had been festering for years.
Four men convicted of murdering Liverpool council worker Ashley Dale
Ashley Dale, 28, was shot dead in her home during a targeted attack; she was alone with her dog when killed.
She reached for her phone and tried to call him
Mark
So this was a case of mistaken identity, or was Ashley Dale actually part of the conflict?
Mimi
No, she wasn't part of it at all. She was collateral damage in a feud between her boyfriend and another man over drugs. The court heard her own voice notes describing the tension, but she was just caught in the middle.
Luke
The source says the feud started three years before the murder, but we don't have detail on exactly what the Hillside group did or how Harrison got involved. We know Barry felt wronged, but the full picture of the drug theft and why it mattered so much—that's not fully explained.
Mark
Why would they target her if they wanted to hurt Harrison?
Mimi
It was a way to get at him. Killing his girlfriend sends a message. He wasn't there that night, but she was, and she was vulnerable.
Luke
The source doesn't explain whether they knew Harrison wouldn't be home, or if they just found her there and went through with it anyway. That's an important distinction we can't make from what's reported.
Mark
What about the men who were acquitted?
Mimi
Fitzgibbon fled to Dubai and was extradited from Spain, but the jury found he wasn't involved in the actual murder. He'd seen Barry threaten Harrison at Glastonbury, but that wasn't enough to convict him. Radford was also cleared.
Luke
The source doesn't say what Fitzgibbon's role was supposed to be, or why he was charged in the first place. And we don't know what Radford was accused of doing—just that he was found not guilty of assisting an offender.
Mark
Did Harrison cooperate with police?
Mimi
No. The court noted he didn't cooperate after Dale's death, which is striking given that his girlfriend was murdered.
Luke
We don't know why he didn't cooperate. That could mean many things—fear, loyalty to the criminal world he was part of, distrust of police. The source doesn't explain his silence.
Der Puls
- Ashley Dale was alone at home when James Witham kicked down her door and shot her — she was not the intended target, but she paid the ultimate price for a feud that was never hers.
- The killing was the violent endpoint of a three-year conflict between her boyfriend and a rival, reignited at Glastonbury just two months before her death and escalating rapidly into a coordinated murder plot.
- In the weeks before she died, Dale had been recording voice notes on her phone describing the danger closing in — that phone was found beside her body in the back garden.
- After the shooting, the convicted men scattered — some to hotels, one to a golf resort preparing to flee abroad — before arrests closed the net around them.
- A jury at Liverpool Crown Court has now returned guilty verdicts against all four men for murder, with sentencing imminent and additional convictions for conspiracy to murder Dale's boyfriend and possession of a prohibited submachine gun.
In the summer of 2022, a young woman named Ashley Dale was killed in her Liverpool home — not for anything she had done, but because of a feud she had inherited through love. A jury has now found four men guilty of her murder, a verdict that closes one chapter in a story about how organised crime's gravitational pull can draw in the entirely innocent. Dale, 28, was an environmental health officer who spent her final evening watching television with her dog; the men convicted of ending her life were bound together by a dispute over stolen drugs that had been festering for years.
Ashley Dale, a 28-year-old environmental health officer, was shot dead in her Liverpool home on the night of August 21, 2022. She had stayed in that evening, watching television with her dachshund, while her boyfriend Lee Harrison was out with friends. When James Witham kicked down her door and fired a single shot into her abdomen, she was alone. In her final moments, she reached for her phone and tried to call Harrison. That phone, found beside her body in the back garden, also held voice notes she had recorded in the weeks before her death — recordings in which she described a conflict that was not hers but had come to surround her life.
The feud at the centre of the case had been running for roughly three years, rooted in a dispute between Harrison and Niall Barry over drugs allegedly stolen by the Hillside organised crime group, with whom Harrison was aligned. The tension had flared again at Glastonbury festival in June 2022, just two months before the murder. A fifth defendant told the court he had witnessed Barry threatening Harrison at the festival; that man was later acquitted of all charges after fleeing to Dubai and being extradited from Spain.
On Monday, a jury at Liverpool Crown Court found Witham, Joseph Peers, Barry, and Sean Zeisz guilty of Dale's murder. The four were also convicted of conspiracy to murder Harrison, who was not present when the shooting took place. Witham, Peers, and Barry faced the additional charge of conspiracy to possess a Skorpion submachine gun and ammunition. In the aftermath of the killing, the men had scattered — some to a hotel in St Helens before heading north, Barry to a golf resort in Formby where he was arrested as he prepared to leave the country. Sentencing was set for the following morning.
A Liverpool council worker was shot dead in her own home on a summer night in 2022, caught in the crossfire of a feud she did not start. Ashley Dale, 28, an environmental health officer, was alone in her house in the Old Swan area on August 21 when James Witham, 41, kicked down her door and fired a shot into her abdomen. On Monday, a jury at Liverpool Crown Court found Witham, along with Joseph Peers, 29, Niall Barry, 26, and Sean Zeisz, 28, guilty of her murder. The court determined the killing was planned and deliberate—a targeted attack meant not just for Dale but as a message to someone else entirely.
The real target was Dale's boyfriend, Lee Harrison. The four men were also convicted of conspiracy to murder him, though he was not present when the shooting occurred. Harrison had been out with friends that evening while Dale stayed home watching television with her dachshund, Darla. In her final moments, she reached for her phone and tried to call him. That phone, recovered next to where she was found in the back garden, contained voice notes she had recorded in the two months before her death—recordings in which she described a deepening conflict between Harrison and Barry, a feud that had been simmering for roughly three years.
The animosity began when Harrison sided with the Hillside organised crime group after they allegedly stole drugs from Barry. The two men's paths crossed again at Glastonbury festival in June 2022, two months before the murder, and the tension reignited. A fifth defendant, Ian Fitzgibbon, told the jury he witnessed Barry threatening to stab Harrison at the festival. Fitzgibbon, who had fled to Dubai after the shooting and was later extradited from Spain, was acquitted of Dale's murder and all related charges. A sixth man, Kallum Radford, was found not guilty of assisting an offender.
In the days after Dale was killed, Witham and Peers checked into a hotel in St Helens before heading to Scotland. Barry was arrested at a golf resort in Formby as he prepared to leave the country. The three men—Witham, Peers, and Barry—were also convicted of conspiracy to possess a prohibited weapon, specifically a Skorpion submachine gun, and ammunition. Zeisz's convictions were limited to the murder charge itself. Sentencing was scheduled for the following morning, with the court still to determine what prison terms would follow.
Bemerkenswerte Zitate
The court heard how the murder was planned and carried out by the four men— Liverpool Crown Court verdict
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